Blush - Jamie Brenner Page 0,12

the tension as she turned the key in the front door. The brownstone had double doors, the first a heavyweight wrought iron. Steven helped her pull it open, and in the time it took for her to unlock the second door she’d decided to invite him in.

Still, she made a show of acting like this was in no way a romantic overture, trying to act casual as she stopped in the mail room and collected her bills out of the small square door in the row of a dozen other square metal doors. She had closed and locked the door with her tiny mail key when she felt his hand on her back—gentle, an almost imperceptible touch. When she turned, the intensity in his eyes gave her butterflies. He’s going to kiss me, she thought. But he hesitated, and so she took one step forward, tilting her face toward him. He pressed against her, moving her back flat against the wall of mailboxes, his mouth meeting hers. In the morning, she would look in the mirror and find marks where the metal had bit into her shoulder blades. But in the moment, all she felt was the soft pressure of his lips, the coolness of his hands slipping under her light jacket, the hammering of her own heart.

Somehow, they made their way upstairs, into her bed. A little voice in her head asked her if she really wanted to sleep with someone she worked with—on the first date. Not even a date! But that voice was no match for the overwhelming drive she felt to be naked and against him and touched by him.

He peeled off her clothes so slowly, it was as if he was giving himself a chance to reconsider. In fact, he murmured at one point, “Is this a good idea?”

Her answer was tugging off her underwear and unzipping his jeans. His body was chiseled and taut, and she ran her hands over it with unabashed admiration. She had slept with only two other men, and neither had inspired such fervor. After a short while, a switch seemed to flip within Steven, and any hint of hesitation was gone. His mouth was on her neck, her breasts, and when he touched her between her legs, her stomach fluttered like she was looking over a ledge. When he moved inside her, she felt, Yes, this is it. She was twenty-three years old and finally experiencing the delirious heights of sexual ecstasy. Her body had a mind of its own, and that night, it spoke in a language she’d never heard before but in which she became fluent over the decades.

But lately, for the past year or so, it seemed they’d somehow fallen into the “friend zone.” They still enjoyed each other’s company; they talked and laughed and kissed and hugged. But sex? She had no interest. And he barely seemed to have more than she did. Or maybe it was her own lack of enthusiasm that had dampened his. Either way, it was concerning.

Steven gave her a peck on the cheek and was snoring lightly before she’d even adjusted her pillow.

Leah turned off her bedside light. She would be awake for hours.

Six

In a house full of extraordinary rooms, the library was possibly the most extraordinary. It had captured Sadie’s imagination as a young girl and never lost its grip.

This past winter, toiling away in the college library, trying desperately to make something workable out of her thesis, she thought about her grandparents’ vast book collection. Now, her first morning at Hollander Estates, she hoped the library of her childhood would jump-start her work. That it would justify her impulsive decision to run out to the vineyard after she’d told her parents she wouldn’t be there.

Don’t be sorry for me. I feel sorry for you. You think you’re living some big “life of the mind.” But you’re not living at all.

Holden was wrong, of course. She was fine. She didn’t have a problem. And to prove it, she was going to enjoy a few days of vacation with her family. And make progress on her thesis.

If only she wasn’t so distracted by their breakup.

Holden, an avid bird watcher, would have loved to have seen the European starling perched on one of the vineyard posts yesterday afternoon. Sadie snapped a photo but held back from sending it. The night before, when the sun set with a streak of purple across the sky, she thought of him again.

She knew, deep down,